


Lights in the Rear View

by Midnight_Run



Category: Servamp (Anime & Manga)
Genre: M/M, Memory Issues, Non-Linear Narrative, One-sided Kamiya Tsurugi/Touma Taishi, Past Minor Arisuin Mikuni/Kamiya Tsurugi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-19
Updated: 2018-10-19
Packaged: 2019-07-23 23:05:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16168634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Midnight_Run/pseuds/Midnight_Run
Summary: Sometimes he falls through the cracks in his mind, tumbling back and forth and round and round.





	Lights in the Rear View

**Author's Note:**

  * For [TereziMakara](https://archiveofourown.org/users/TereziMakara/gifts).



_“It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards,' says the White Queen to Alice.”_  
― Lewis Carroll, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland  & Through the Looking-Glass

**+++**

"Did you do the homework for tomorrow?" Tsurugi asks, distracted. 

Everything is distracting.

The spider building an intricate web in the corner, the quiet turn of pages nearby, the hum of the air conditioner kicking on, the feel of fingernails scratching over his scalp.  
  
He knows he's said the wrong thing again by the way those fingers hesitate, the way Yumi glances at him sharp enough that he can almost feel the cut of his gaze.

That glance tells him everything he needs to know.

He's not sixteen anymore, he's older... maybe twenty, maybe thirty, maybe something in-between.

He doesn't know. 

Sometimes the past leaks away and he's left standing in the present and there's a chasm in his head and it's a long, long way down.

There's no homework because there's no school, not for a long time.    
  
"Joking!" He interjects quickly, forcing a laugh, but he can tell Yumi doesn't believe him. That Yumi can hear the awkwardness in it, he's never been good at lying, not to them. Still, Yumi tightens his fingers in his hair and gives the strands a halfhearted yank. 

"Not funny, shithead," he grumbles and his voice is deep, so much deeper than it had been at seven or fifteen or sixteen. It's kind of manly or sexy or something like that. It doesn't seem like the sort of voice Yumi, pretty Yumi with the long blond hair, should have and it makes him laugh even as his stomach turns as his brain worries at the question over and over again.

How old is he?

How old are they?

"Hair pulling is seventy thousand yen, Yumi-chan."

He has little wrinkles in the corners of his eyes; laughter, maybe, but more likely... anger or worry.  

"I'm not paying you anything, asshole," Yumi grumbles, color in cheeks that aren't as full as they were then, but still flush just as prettily. He's always liked the way Yumi looks when he's embarrassed.

It makes him want... _things_.

Never anything specific or easy to define. Just to be _close_.

To touch.

To be touched.

It's the easiest thing in the world to take advantage of his distraction to turn over, to sit up, to clamor into Yumi's lap and loop his arms around his neck, catch fingers in the long ponytail hanging down his back, and press their foreheads together and smile. 

Yumi sighed and leaned into the touch, not quite smiling, but it still made him feel warm all the way down.

At sixteen, Yumi would have shoved him off, would have been embarrassed or angry. Yumi used to hate him sometimes, most times. Things were different now, Yumi's hands slid up his back, humoring him like he wouldn't have at fourteen or sixteen or even seven. They're bigger than they were then too, stronger, pressing hard against familiar knots of pressure with the ease of long habit.

It feels good.

How long has it been since he was sixteen?

Since they were sixteen?

One year? Two? Ten?

Everything feels both foreign and familiar at once.

The feel of Yumi's hair as he curls it around his fingers and the smell of soap on his skin and the puddle of heat in his belly, like lava churning. 

The air conditioner clicks off.

There's a camera in the corner of his room.

If he listens closely he's sure he can hear the whir of the auto-focus.

Is Touma watching them?

Is he there?

Will he call his name? Put a stop to it?

"You okay?" Yumi asks in that gruff voice, that old voice.

Once they'd gone to Yumi's house after school.

It had been big and fancy and empty.

Yumi had asked them to stay, but he couldn't. He had to get home, because Touma would be wondering where he'd gone and he didn't want to disappoint him.

He never wanted....

They'd fought about it.

They always fought about Touma.

Yumi and Jun never understood about Touma.

They didn't know him like he did.

They didn't....

"Where's Jun-chan?" He asks and he knows he's asked the wrong thing again and there's no walking it back this time, no pretending, Yumi's fingers dig in against his spine.

He's in a dark room.

Or maybe he never left.

He wakes in the dark sometimes, too often alone, and he wonders how much time has passed and what day it is and whether he's awake or dreaming still.

Sometimes.

Often.

Always. 

It's usually cold.

The wind always blows in through the cracks of the room that stinks of cigarette smoke.

There's never any warmth to be found there.

He wakes slowly, too hot, sweat damp against on his back and neck, and the sound of quiet conversation, “I'll send him to a private school. I'd send him to live with my Mom, but I don't know if I could stand being away from him like that even if it is the best thing for him.”

Jun.

That's Jun's voice.

He loves Jun.

There's a big, warm hand settled against his hip,beneath his shirt, thumb stroking absently across his skin. It feels familiar. Everything feels familiar, comfortable, like sinking into a warm bath.

Bare toes brush his ankles, a soft touch he pursues, digging his toes in against unseen ankles, heels and toes. 

“You don't need to do that. We can keep him safe,” another voice murmurs, deep, warm where the words are spoken against the back of his neck.

Yumi.

He loves Yumi too.

“Can we?” 

It's such a quiet question, an important question, filled with unhappiness, with uncertainty. It makes things inside him ache.

He doesn't want them to be sad.

He's never wanted that.

Never, never.

But he can't make them happy.

He can't make anyone happy.

Not even himself.

But he can pretend.

“I can keep anyone safe for the bargain price of forty-six thousand yen,” he offers, startled by how strange his voice sounds. How deep, how old, how utterly unlike him.

Him?

And who _was_ he anyway?

He's not sure, not now, not yet, it returns in drips, fragments of truth dribbled into his brain like falling rain.

He is… nothing.

Something.

Someone.

No one. 

Nameless.

Filthy.

Needy.

Selfish.

He is….

He _is._

Fingers brush against his cheek, soft, gentle, and he leans into the touch.

“Hey, you back with us?”

Jun.

“Did I go somewhere?” He asks and his voice is rough and strange, but it's still his own and he can feel the gaze they exchange in the way the tension surges through the bodies pressed so close against him, the way the fingers and toes still, frozen, waiting to see where he stands, what he remembers. 

This is familiar too.

They've been here many times before.

Dark rooms and warm bodies and expectations.

The hand at his waist tightens, fingers digging in as if they can keep him there by force of will.

"No, you're here with us, where you belong."

Yumi.

"Fucking Touma, I'll fucking kill him this time, I swear to fuck," Yumi growls even as Jun shushes him, because you never knew who was listening.

You never ever knew who was watching. 

Even in the dark.

It's nice being there, nestled between them.

Being with them has always been....

He remembers.

Being together with them, on assignment, his arms bound to his sides, Yumi at his back and Jun to carry them home.

He remembers them snarling and glaring at Touma like they know, like they understand, when they don't and they never have and they never can, because Yumi and Jun's world is filled with light. And everything they have learned of darkness they've learned from him. He's left his dirty black fingerprints all over them, pressed against Jun's face and Yumi's chest, against feet and hands and toes and necks. Kisses, childish, chaste kisses that mean nothing at all and deep, soul-searing kisses that mean everything, that tear the fabric of the world and pull them down into an abyss like he can make them see, make them feel, make them know, make them _understand_.

They can't get rid of Touma.

They can't kill Touma.

Touma is important.

 _Family_.

Touma is inside him.

All the way down.

Deep, deep, deep and without Touma he is nothing and he is no one and he's in the room, in the dark, a flithy nameless thing and everything hurts and he doesn't know anything at all.

They don't understand.

Touma.

Him.

But it's okay.

It's okay.

He can't expect them to, he shouldn't expect them to, he doesn't have the words to explain.

How do you explain the dark to people who don't know it? Don't feel it? Don't taste it? How do you explain what it is to be alone to people who aren't? He can't leave him alone, he wouldn't know how, he's never known how. 

Sometimes... sometimes he thought he caught a glimpse, a peek into another dark room.

Into that bare, white and black existence that had been just the two of them... three of them.

It wasn't for long and wasn't often and everything that happened in that room didn't mean anything because they were different, so different, totally different, nothing alike.

And you couldn't be sorry and you couldn't feel bad, even when it hurt.

Mikuni was easy.

He was easy to protect.

He would have been easy to die for too.

Wouldn't even miss him when he was gone.

They weren't family.

They weren't anything.

And if they were, they never talked about it.

Never even thought about it for too long, because there was no point, there was never any point.

And if you never call a thing by its name, it doesn't really exist.

Nothing changed and he was no good at it and he never was and never would be.

Don't mind, don't mind.

"Tsurugi?" Jun calls and he's there in the dark with them once more, pressed between them, almost too warm, but unwilling to move, summoned from the edge of a terrible tumble.

"Jun-chan?" He asks and he knows Jun is sad, that he's said the wrong thing or done the wrong thing and he wants to make it up. 

He leans in and kisses him. It's dark so the kiss lands, open-mouthed and sloppy, against his cheek and Jun makes a sound, a quiet sound and then that goes quiet as he adjusts to fit their mouths together, sliding a hand between them to cup his cheek to hold him still, to keep him there, right there, where he can feel him, know him, taste him.

Where he doesn't have to remember and he can just be.

Jun frees himself slowly, carefully, gentle so gentle, and he can't understand how he can be so very gentle, but he always is. 

That, at least, never changes.  

He laughs and it hurts, like broken glass in his throat and he wipes damp from his cheeks.

He shouldn't have done that, he shouldn't have done that and Jun will tell him it's okay, but it isn't.

He isn't.

"It's okay," Jun tells him, hands on his shoulders, anchoring him to the bed, to the ground, keeping him from the sky. "We've got you."

“You can't go anywhere we can't follow you,” Yumi breathes against the back of his neck and the thumb stroking against his back slides up his spine and down again and again, soothing.

He turns his head to press a trembling kiss against Yumi's chin. It's rough, like he hasn't shaved recently.

"You're okay," Jun murmurs, "Everything will be okay."

It's a lie, of course, but it's a nice lie.

Yumi still sounds worried, angry. 

Jun still sounds sad.

He doesn't want them to worry.

Doesn't want them to be angry.

Or sad.

He's not the sort of person people should worry about.

Especially not them.

But it seems like they always have.

Even when he's like this, eyes closed, just this side of oblivion, he can’t really pretend that everything is good. That there's nothing strange about their faces, about how Yumi's body curls around his own, so much taller than it should be. How their hands feel when they take possession of his own, a hundred tiny changes, scars that shouldn't exist but do. How their voices don't crack and break the way he half expects them to. 

How much time has passed?

Too much time?

How old is he now?

Sixteen?

Seventeen?

Twenty-four?

A hundred?

He doesn't know.

He never knows.

Some days he wakes up and they aren't there and he panics because it seems like maybe he's made them up, like maybe he's still just the boy in the dark, dark room with bruises on his wrists, his chest, his legs.

But he remembers waking like that which means he remembers other things too.

He's not sixteen.

He's twenty-six.

Jun is a father. 

Yumi is... not. 

Probably.

“Stupid,” Mikuni mutters, voice rough, arm slung around his waist, hand splayed against his stomach, bringing him back to the present, to the moment.

He's eighteen again... or nineteen, maybe.

Twenty-three? Twenty-four?

He's not sure.

Yesterday or today or maybe sometime in the future, he's not sure. 

Did he say what he was thinking out loud?

Sometimes he says things he doesn't mean to say when he's drunk. And he's definitely drunk now. The world feels soft and fuzzy around the edges and he can smell the familiar tart, fruity edge sharp tang of wine in the air and on their clothes and he can taste it still on the back of his tongue and everything feels warm and good and squishy.

It's been a long time since Mikuni was his roommate.

He doesn't come to visit often.

Mikuni's arms are tight around his shoulders, his forehead cool where it rests against the back of his neck, fingers digging in against his shoulders. It's not what he comes there for, he thinks, but they've both has enough wine to make bad ideas seem good. He grips his forearms, fine white cloth soft beneath his fingers.

When the power comes back on and the wine urging them to action loses its grip upon them, they'll stop, they'll forget, they'll pretend it very happened, because they're different, so different and they'll have to go back to being lonely, lonely, lonely.

To not caring.

And then it's gone.

He's gone.

They're gone.

The wine taste is still on his tongue, but he's older, his body aching in ways it didn't a year ago or two years ago and it's Yumi who is touching him, holding him, curling into and around him like he only does when they've both had far too much to drink and it makes him feel restless and antsy and eager to please.

Sometimes he can feel them beside him, both of them, holding him between them again. Yumi tossing out insults that sound like endearments as Jun keeps them both steady, keeps everything from falling apart, as they anchor him to the moment.

Whispering affection against his skin, trying to keep him, protect him even though he isn't really there, isn't really anywhere.

"Tsurugi? Are you okay?"

He nods, quickly, emphatically, because he can't quite find the words to tell them how much he wants this, wants them there with him, always. 

They're... what?

What were they to each other?

Jun should be at home with his... son? Daughter? Kid? He's not sure, doesn't remember, but he knows there's someone who deserves Jun's attention more than he does. That Jun shouldn't be there trying to take care of him, he shouldn't… but even though he knows... the knowledge still seems strange, doesn't make any sense, because they're too young to have kids though Jun does really like that girl whose name he can't remember and can't forget, a name that's lodged in the back of his throat and the back of his head and something, something, something _bad_ happened. 

He did something… bad.

He wasn't there.

He didn't hear it.

And he was.

And he did.

And he.... 

He was a bad thing that happened.

Someone's coming...

Who?

He couldn't protect anyone.

He... tried.

Didn't he?

He didn't hear it.

He....

But even as he reaches for it, the thought drifts away and he's drunk again, warm, Yumi beside him, soft at the edges, hand against his belly, leg thrown carelessly over his.

Jun beside them, head pillowed against his shoulder, snoring softly, and the boy, _their_ boy, their good boy, is snuggled down between them, warm, tiny fist caught in his hair, tiny foot lodged in his throat.

It's really uncomfortable.

And it makes him smile nonetheless.

So wide it feels like his face might break and fall to pieces around it.

Family.

They're his....

The room is dark.

He wants to be held.

To feel arms around him.

To know that he's safe.

But Touma's eyes are cold, always cold now, and family is a dirty word.

Touma only wants one thing from him now.

Just one.

It's what he's worth.

And that's okay, that's okay, he knows that nothing is free.

Nothing, nothing.

Not family.

Not safety.

Food and money and safety and money and power and money and love and money and it's okay, it's okay, he understands.

Mikuni used to say that maybe one day he'd get himself killed, go insane and wipe them all out and maybe then Touma would finally pat him on the head like he wanted and tell him he was a good boy.

He'd laughed and laughed and laughed and asked him how his little brother was.

There was blood on his tongue and his lip was split and he still couldn't stop laughing.

He's with Yumi again.

Too much wine and no Jun there to take them home, to remind them that it's not a good idea to do those kind of things with your best friend, even when you're both _really_ drunk and _really_  lonely and you're both asking and both saying yes and it feels good to hold someone like they mean something, like they mean everything.

Sometimes he offers to let Yumi kiss him for a hundred thousand yen just to see the fire anger lights in his eyes. To hear his stupid, _don't kiss people for money lecture, shithead_  lecture where he loses track of what he's saying a half dozen times and finally dozes off against his shoulder, warm and drooling a little on his collarbone. 

Sometimes he doesn't say anything at all and Yumi slides his arms around his back and buries his face against his throat, he pretends that the damp he feels against his skin is just Yumi drooling because he's fallen asleep again even though he knows it isn't. Even though they've both had too much to drink and everything is easy and hazy and he can push his fingers into the silky weight of Yumi’s hair and drag it out of its ponytail so it falls around him, over them both, like a blanket.

Soft.

“You're so stupid,” Yumi mutters and it sounds like he's saying something else entirely, but he doesn't know what.

He never knows.

He drifts for a while.

He wakes up screaming, power, _his_ power, lashing out around him.

He needs to save them.

Protect them.

Kill them.

Filthy.

Hurt.

There's blood on his hands.

Or maybe it's just sauce.

Or wine.

His clothes are covered in it. 

Splotches of white and red and he can hear Mikuni at his back, leaning against him in the dark, breathing hard.

His lip hurts and he tongues the cut there gingerly, frowning, "Lucky shot. Wanna hit me again? I'll give you the friends and family discount. Only seventy thousand yen, it's a steal."

"Shut up," Mikuni huffs, driving a half-hearted elbow into his side.

He smiles and leans his head back against his shoulder.

He's so tired.

"Don't touch my Abel. You'll get her dirty," he mutters, quiet and vicious even as he tucks the doll beneath his cheek before turning his attention to stitching up his side, movements quick and efficient. 

He'll have a scar there.

And then he's alone.

Again.

Still.

Always.

He dreams of sunlight on his face.

Of hands offered.

Hands refused.

Of sitting in Yumi's house, surrounded by picture books, drinking tea and laughing at pretty Yumi in his frilly, fancy dresses.

He wakes and Taku is sitting in his lap where Jun has plopped him despite his protests. He gurgles cheerfully as he pulls at his cheek, his hair.

It hurts a little. 

Like each yank is yanking at a string tied around his heart, pulling it tight and tighter.

He hugs him hard, maybe too hard.

Babies are fragile.

He's not sure how much is too much.

He tries not to squeeze when Taku gurgles and wiggles and giggles and squeals or flinch when Taku hits his shoulders with his chubby fists or gives his hair another sharp yank.

He holds him gently, as gently as he can, and buries his face in the clean, soapy scent of baby and his skin feels too big and too small all at once.

He loves him.

He loves them.

He does.

He _does_.

Even though he doesn't really know what it means.

He's sure he does.

_Don't let me hurt him._

He doesn't say it.

But he thinks it sometimes.

Most times.

Sometimes he wakes up and he's sure he's killed them.

Killed everyone.

That he can't protect anyone.

Touma pats his head and it feels like benediction.

It's okay for him to live.

It's okay.

He's alone in a dark room.

They're alone in a dark room. 

An airplane flies across the sky overhead, carried by a sharp wind.

He isn't sure who threw it, but he knows the hands that made it.

He always knows.

He should follow it, but he can't.

Taku is a heavy weight against his chest, pinning him to the ground while cartoons play on the television. He turns his head to the side and stares blankly at the screen where an otter is making friends with a squirrel.

They seem happy.

Or at least they're smiling.

They're so different.

He wonders if they envy each other their very different lives. Probably not. Why would an otter want to gather nuts?

Taku squeals and claps his chubby hands together, heels kicking against his side.

He's afraid he'll fall, but he can't bring himself to raise his hands and grab him.

What if he hurts him?  

He's hurt a lot of people.

He's killed so many, many, many, many, many, many, many.... 

_Lots._

Taku continues to kick him happily.

He can let him have those kicks for free.

He doesn't mind spoiling him a little.

Nothing's too good for Taku.

For his special boy.

For his family.

“What are you doing? Spacing out again?” Yumi’s fingers snap in front of his face, loud, and Jun sighs, telling him to knock it off.

They have their desks pushed close together.

Lunch.

They're having lunch together.

They usually do.

It's nice. 

It's always nice.

Jun pushes an extra bento box at him.

He needs to eat, he says. 

 _Still too skinny_ , his expression screams.

He looks worried.

He should smile.

Smiles put people at ease, Touma says.

_Smile._

He does.

It's easier when they're close. 

When they're in bright places. 

He can divide it into parts.

Dark.

Light.

Yumi and Jun’s friend.

Touya’s useful tool.

He wants to scream. 

It feels like he is.

All the time, until it doesn't anymore, until it's just part of the background, just noise, unimportant, something easily ignored.

It doesn't matter.

He doesn't matter.

Where was he? 

Touma tosses him a paper-wrapped hamburger. It's not quite cold, but it's not warm either.

It tastes like wax paper and too much mayo. 

He's sitting with Jun on the couch, his head is heavy and he lets it fall against Jun’s shoulder.

Jun doesn't push him off.

Yumi would have.

Yumi doesn't like to be touched when he's sober, not like that, soft like that, it embarrasses him, like when they talk about the dress up pictures.

He never seems to know what to do with his hands.

He feels greedy when he does this, when he asks for more than Jun volunteers, more than Yumi wants to give. Pushes him, pushes them both, gets between them, like he deserves to be there, between them, beside them.

He knows he doesn't.

He _knows_.

He can't protect them.

No matter how much they pay him.

But it doesn't stop him from wanting, wanting, _wanting_. 

A toddler waves a pudgy fist in his face, grinning triumphantly, "Chu!"  
  
There's a voice calling him, summoning him back from the swamp of memory in which he so often finds himself mired.   
  
The kid is tall, or maybe they just seem tall because they're looking down at him their hands on their hips, a pout on their lips and the sun at their back. 

He's familiar, but for a long terrible moment he can't quite place him. 

A hand falls against his hand, smoothing his hair and he realizes he's lying on a blanket in the middle of a park, he can see the golden beacon of Yumi's hair bouncing back and forth as he gestures wildly while arguing with a man near one of the food carts. 

"The ice cream man said something mean and Papa Yumi is gonna beat him up," the child informs them helpfully.  

 Jun sighs wearily, reaching out to ruffle the kid's hair gently as he climbs reluctantly to his feet, "Stay here, Taku-chan, I'll go talk him down."

They're older, so much older than he remembers them being, but for once it doesn't scare him. 

"Don't call me that, I'm not a _baby_!" Taku snapped, squirming out from beneath the fall of Jun's hand and Jun just smiles, fondly, rolling his eyes.

The sun is warm and the breeze is cool and Taku plopped down next to him with a pout, clearly disappointed to be missing all the action. 

He should say something comforting.

"Hi Taku-chan," he sings instead, rolling over and propping himself up on one hand.

The smile he receives in return is small and terribly warm, "Are you okay? Does your head still hurt?"

His small hand is cool when he sets it against his forehead and so much bigger than it was when he was small.

His chest feels very tight.

The sun is very bright overhead.

The room is dark, but he can see it peeking through the cracks in the blinds.  
  
"Hey, wake up already, dumbass!" Yumi's voice is that weird balance between worried and angry again and he opens his eyes, shocked, as a hand slaps his ass.

He's naked and his mouth tastes bitter, like sour grapes.

He was dreaming about the past again, but the dream is already fading leaving only the present in its wake. He must have dozed off. Last thing he remembered he was.... 

Laughing as he dropped to his knees, a bit harder than he meant to, before crawling beneath the bed in search of the remote Yumi had thrown at him when he took off his wine-stained shirt and tossed it over his head.

All of which had _seemed_ like a good idea at the time though he doesn't remember at all what they'd ended up watching or when he'd taken his pants off.

Or how he'd fallen asleep on the remote as he lifted his head just enough to peel it off his cheek and rub his fingers over the skin, bumpy and warm with the impression of buttons. 

His muscles are sore and his joints ached, protesting even those subtle movements as his head throbbed to remind him why drinking that much only _seemed_ like a good idea.

An arm tightened around his waist, warm breath huffing against the sweaty skin of his thigh as a hand batted at him in vague, aimless protest of his movements. 

"Morning, Jun-chan," he replied, grinning and propping himself up. Jun was also mostly naked... which was rare for Jun who usually opted out of drinking and almost always slept in loose fitting pants and a t-shirt, but it was far too warm for clothes.

It was the middle of the summer, after all, and they'd never gotten air conditioning so there was just the tiny overworked fan in the corner, which was currently mostly blocked by Yumi's very naked body standing in front of it hogging all its meager efforts for himself.

"Aw, naked Yumi, you're so pretty," he commented, learing up at him as Yumi's face flushed a bright, bright red.

"Shut up, asshole," Yumi grumbled, fidgeting with the shirt in his hands. "It's your fault anyway."

" _Is_ it?" 

It probably was. He had a vague memory of pouring the dregs of the wine in Yumi's lap in retaliation for... _something_.  

Tsurugi's grin widened and he glanced down at where Jun's head was resting against his hip, just the back of his head visible.

His hair is getting a bit thin.

"You owe two hundred thousand yen," he commented, threading his fingers into Jun's hair as Yumi continued to tower above them, glowering down, hands on his hips.

"I'm not freaking paying you for that," Yumi replied, rolling his eyes before tugging the shirt over his head.

"It's a deal, you know! My services as a pillow are in high demand. Just look how comfortable Jun-chan is."

"I'm not paying you either," Jun yawned, turning his head to smile at him sleepily. "You sleep on me all the time."

He's never seen Jun look so... _relaxed_.

It's a nice look on him.

Even if it is weird.

Everything since he'd woken up had been weird, but he couldn't smell anything burning so he probably wasn't having a stroke or anything.

He touched a tentative hand against Jun's forehead, "This was fun you should drink with us more often."

"Up," Yumi called again, bumping his leg.

"Nah, come back to bed," he called, grinning as he hooked a foot around the back of Yumi's knee and tried to pull him back into the bed without dislodging Jun.

It didn't work. 

Probably because Yumi was so tall and their bed was too low to the ground.

"Oy, fuck off, we need a bigger bed if we're all gonna sleep in it like that," Yumi grumbled, dodging his hold and finally yanking the shirt over his head. "That little shit Mahiru and his boyfriend are gonna be back here with Taku anytime now. Get up and get dressed already."

"Thirty thousand yen," he replied, smiling at Yumi's unimpressed expression.

"I'm not paying you just to get dressed, asshole," Yumi grumbled, snatching a pair of pants off the floor and hoping on one leg and then the other as he pulled them on. "Do you want to traumatize our kid with the sight of your naked ass? Because I don't think I won't let him just walk in here."

Our kid.

_Our._

The memories were slow to return, they always were whenever he fell down through the cracks and got lost in the past, but they meandered back as he laid on his back watching Yumi snag a brush from the dresser and curse as he attempted to yank it through the tangles in his long, long hair.

They were eighteen the first time he'd kissed Yumi.

They'd broken into Yumi's parents' wine cellar and stolen a bottle of something ridiculously expensive to share between themselves. 

There'd been a little park a couple blocks down the road from Yumi's house and, even though it was late and stupid to do it, they'd gone there and finished the whole thing as they took turns pushing each other on the swings, higher and higher until the combination of alcohol and whooshing through the air started to make their heads spin too much.

The moon had been high in the sky by the time they'd chucked the empty bottle in a trash can and Yumi had grabbed his hand and yanked him over beneath a big tree where they could collapse together on the damp grass, too tired and too drunk to make it home on their own.

He'd expected Yumi to let go of his hand right away, but he hadn't. Instead he'd kept hold of it, playing over his palm and fingers with his own, touch lingering over scars and fingers pushing between his own.

It felt good.

The world had felt fuzzy and light in a way it very usually did and it had seemed like the easiest thing in the world to run his fingertips across Yumi's palm, across the collection of tiny, raised scars on his long fingers.

"You don't like me very much do you?"

"The fuck kind of question is that? I'm here with you, aren't i?"

That was true.

He rolled over onto his belly, popping up onto his elbows, "Can I kiss you, Yumi-chan?"

"Fu- what? Why the hell would you want to do that?"

"I saw Jun kissing that girl he likes the other day. It looked fun."

"Fun?"

"I'll even let you kiss me for free. Just this once. Since it's my first," he offered, grinning at the way Yumi's face screwed up like it couldn't decide what expression to make so it was trying to make them all at once."

"You're so fucking stupid, I can't stand it," Yumi snapped, rolling over until he bumped against him and shoving up onto his elbows. "You sure you want to do this with me?"

It's easy to lean across the distance between them and press their lips together, just barely, just as touch.

His lips taste sweet.

Like strawberries.

He'd been twenty-five the first time Jun had kissed him.

He'd been laying on the couch at Jun's house watching television, Taku sprawled fast asleep across his chest with one fat little hand tangled in his shirt and the other clutching a stuffed sloth to his chest, and Jun had knelt down beside him to press a kiss to Taku's cheek.

He'd done the same thing a dozen times before and Tsurugi still wasn't sure what had made that time different from any of the others, but he'd caught Jun hesitating beside him and he'd grabbed him by his shirt front and pulled him in, quick as lightning, "Don't I get a good night kiss too?"

He hadn't really expected Jun to take him up on it.

Jun kissed like he did everything else, quick and thorough and efficient and when it was over Jun had knelt beside him and pressed their foreheads together.

And it had felt like something falling into place inside him, something he hadn't known was missing.

When he was twenty-six, his world fell apart and everything changed.

Or it should have at least.

But Yumi and Jun fought for him and forgave him and they'd helped him pick up all the broken pieces of himself in the days and weeks and months that followed.

Touma was... gone.

And the hole in his life where he used to be that still feels empty and strange and hollow, because he's never been able to figure out what that space is or what to do with it and Touma wasn't there to tell him, so it lingered there. 

Like the melancholy laughter that echoed in his dreams.

Like the little boy in the dark, dark room with bruises and the wounds that aren't yet scars and haven't yet faded.

All of it just out of sight.

C3 was gone too.

Most of it anyway.

They're still... whatever they are, the bonds stretch and flex strangely between them and they hold his leash, keep him here, keep him grounded, keep him safe, present, but they don't do jobs for them anymore.

They've been just civilians for so long that it's sometimes hard to believe they had had another life before this one.

Before they became... so hopelessly _domestic_.

He can feel them in the air even when they're not around, a gentle pull like a string tied around his finger reminding him that he's not sixteen anymore.

That he lives in this house, their house, and that he sleeps in this bed, their bed, more often than not, because this is where he belongs.

They watch TV in the evenings and bicker over who has to cook dinner and then invite that brat over to do the cooking for them.

Sometimes they let Taru stay over with the brat and his boyfriend so they can just be together for awhile like they did last night.

And sometimes he meets Mikuni in the park and they sit back to back and they don't talk about the old days, the bad days, and it's nice.

They just sit together and drink their wine from separate bottles and talk about stupid things that don't mean anything to either of them, because he isn't eighteen anymore or twenty-two or twenty-six and eventually the snake takes Mikuni home and Jun shows up to carry him home and they say they aren't going to meet up again, but they always do even though they'll never be anything like friends.

The parts of him that are broken are still broken and won't ever heal, but he's almost never lonely anymore.

Jun rubs a hand over his face and he reaches out and touches the scar on his chest, the one that never fades, and Jun offers him a tired smile, "I forgave you a long time ago."

It seems like the sort of thing he's said a lot, but even if he remembered him saying it, he's not certain he'd ever get tired of hearing it.

"Come on, asshole, get _up_ ," Yumi huffs. "You too, Jun! Why the fuck am I being the responsible one here right now?"

Jun chuckled as he finally sat up, stretching, "I don't think we need to worry about them turning up unannounced. Mahiru-kun is more paranoid about being rude than anyone I've ever seen."

"Whatever. I'm hungry. You're fixing breakfast. Oy, get off your ass and put your _pants_ on already."

The offending pants hit him in the face before he can voice protest. 

His name is Kamiya Tsurugi.

He's thirty-six years old.

Things aren't perfect, but he's happy more often than he's not and he finally has the family he always needed, even it wasn't necessarily the one he'd wanted when he was young.

And though he still gets lost sometimes, falling back into the memories of days long gone, they're always there to lead him back out of the dark and into the light.

**Author's Note:**

> Right... so... this was meant to be a light piece and it did not come out that way at all. I find both Tsurugi's PTSD and memory regressions and how those things are impacted by his power usage really interesting, but I tried to keep the focus more squarely on Tsurugi's relationships here. 
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoyed it and thanks for all those wonderful prompts. Also, thank you so much for updating where you were in reading the manga because the manga is currently in such a Tsurugi intensive section that I was having a really hard time trying to edit myself to make sure I wasn't spoiling things and where you're at in reading it helped a _lot_ in deciding what I wanted to do here since we're at about the same spot. So, yeah, all the future stuff here is just conjecture. ^_^
> 
> You did have a no kid mention on your DNWs, but since you offered a important to canon exception I figured mentions of Taku were probably fine since he's important to the characters and canon in general, but I still tried to keep his appearances/mentions to a minimum just in case.


End file.
